Dzaiddin’s courageous admission that his first priority is to restore public confidence in judiciary a good start for new Chief Justice

(Petaling Jaya, Thursday): Tan Sri Mohamed Dzaiddin Abdullah has made a good start as the new Chief Justice of the Federal Court with his courageous admission in his first day in office  that his first priority is to restore public and international confidence in the judiciary.

It was precisely because his two predecessors refused to recognise the deepening crisis  of confidence in the judiciary in the past 12 years, whether nationally or internationally, all the while pretending that all was well with the judiciary, that the country went through the worst agony  over the system of justice in the nation’s history.

It is not going to be an easy task for Dzaiddin to carry out the judicial reforms necessary to fully restore national and international confidence in the judiciary, but he deserves full support from all Malaysians in this most unenviable but a most patriotic task to clean up house, regain public trust in the independence, impartiality and integrity of the judges and to make the judiciary more open and accountable.

Dzaiddin would have made a great contribution difficult to be matched  by another Malaysian if in his two-year tenure as Chief Justice, he could firmly put in place a system and programme of judicial reforms which could prove the former Lord President Tun Suffian wrong that it would need some two generations for the judiciary to recover from its protracted crisis of confidence.

To ensure the success of such judicial reforms, there should be the fullest participation and involvement not only by judges and legal practitioners, but also by all concerned Malaysians as the system of justice should not be the mere concern of judges and lawyers.

As a start, the memorandum on the judiciary including Proposals for Reform which was submitted by Malaysia’s eminent jurist, Justice Dr. Visu Sinnadurai, to the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister before he was victimised and forced to resign from the bench to join the World Bank as an international jurist should be made public to become a national discussion paper on judicial reforms.

Apart from the very important issues of restoring public confidence in the independence, impartiality and integrity of judges, an open and transparent process of judicial appointments and restoring amicable Bench-Bar relations, Dzaiddin should also focus on how to make the system of justice relevant to the people and the times, including: 

• How, with other institutions, as well as civil society, discharge the important function to hold the other branches of the government accountable for their actions, in particular how to ensure an  effective judicial review of public officials' acts.

• How to provide all citizens, particularly the poor, with access to justice, which must be regarded as a priority agenda for judicial reform.

• How the judiciary could become one of the essential institutions in fighting corruption - including corruption in the judiciary.

• How to foster free speech and an independent media as  both cause and effect of an improved rule of law to provide a check on government, generate support for reform and foster citizen participation. 

• How to  respond to the demands of the 21st century to ensure  efficiency, integrity and fairness in court performance and  law  enforcement by police and prosecutors.

(21/12/2000)